Hot on the heels of ¨Live And Replayed,¨ Günter Müller´s set for Esquilo, comes another solo offering. The music on ¨Reframed¨ consists entirely of the processed sounds of bowed cymbals. Since 1981, Müller´s set-up has involved using mobile pickups to capture percussive sounds, and in more recent years the sounds have also been looped and modified electronically. His sonic palette has been extended by the use of minidisc recorders and iPods, which allow him the opportunity to work with ready-prepared material, and although his credentials as an improvisor are impeccable, this shift in emphasis has resulted in a more composerly approach to his material. In will Montgomery´s largely favourable review of ¨Live and Replayed¨ (The Wire 277), he mentioned that a ¨more ´composed´ approach to ordering the source sounds¨ might prove rewarding. That´s precisely what ¨Reframed¨ offers. Perhaps the most important thing to say about the five pieces of music on Reframed is that they sound absolutely gorgeous. This is one of the most sumptuous musical experiences I’ve had in a long while. The rasping attack as the bow bites and the cymbal begins to sound appears largely to be absent from these recordings, and where attack characteristics are present they seem to have been modified electronically and turned into percussive pulsations. In most cases you wouldn’t know these pieces had been made using cymbals. Once you do, their bright, flaring shimmer and dark undertow, thickened on occasion to the sonority of a not entirely consonant church organ, have a harmonic fingerprint that´s readily identifiable as such. Whether these organic soundscapes have been fully composed or not hardly matters, though, ironically--as the gradual drift of the material and the billowing clouds of sound provide few signposts to inddicate wheere one is in the music--the tendency is to focus more on the moment by moment creation of the piece than on its architecture, akin to what improvisors do.
>Brian Marley, The Wire, 4.2007

As a music journalist you’re always out to find hidden connections and secret links between artists, grouping individual lines together to create movements, schools and styles. So when Günter Müller releases an album with Jason Kahn’s cut label, there is a burning question right away: Why hasn’t this happened much earlier?
There are so many similarities between the approaches of these two artists, regardless of how different their biographies may read and how personal still their music may be, that one can not help but wonder why this hasn’t resulted in more direct interaction: Both currently live in Switzerland, both are trained percussionists and both use their instrument in a highly unusual way. If you want to establish a border, then maybe it has to be seen in the impression that Müller likes to keep the “drum aspect” slightly more intact than Kahn, with echoing pulsations fading in and out on almost all of the five parts of this suite. Which has everything to do with his unique composing set-up of a custom-built drum set with pick-ups and contact microphones, sometimes accompanied by taping devices such as an iPod or MiniDisc player. This points towards a subtle difference in accentuation: If Kahn wants to highlight the sound aspect of his percussions, Müller wants to emphasize the percussive nature inherent to the timbres of his drumset. And yet, this is clearly a drone-album, with atmospherics playing the most important part. Especially the stretched-out twentytwo minutes of “Reframed 2” are a deep soundscape bubbling to the surface from the friction between a more rapidly flowing frequential fountain and inertly undulating bass stimuli. Müller is certainly no stranger to using sonorities as factors for deepness, but he just as much uses the inner rate of movement of his sounds as well as slowmotion effects to suggest spaceousness – such as in the third part, which creates a hypnotic effect by means of nothing more than single-note streaks of light over a droning texture.
Even though the select range of sounds suggests a “minimal” approach, Müller keeps his elements in a constant flow, which again hints at his background as a percussionist. And yet, if you didn’t know it, you would be hard-pressed to tell how “Reframed” was created. This element of suspense is something he again shares with Kahn – and which they have just brought to American stages this month on a tour with the Signal Quintet.
>Tobias Fischer, Tokafi, 5.2007/

"Reframed", die aktuelle Solo-CD von Günter Müller, stellt eine minimalistische Annäherung von Cover-Artwork, wie gewohnt von Jason Kahn formidabel inszeniert, und sonischem Ausgangsmaterial her. Denn ausschließlich der Klang gestrichener Cymbals liegt den fünf nicht näher betitelten Stücken zugrunde. Das wiederum erkennt man eher nicht, wenn man es nicht weiß, weil das Ausgangsmaterial nämlich erwartungsgemäß digital verstrichen und verdröhnt und solcherart zu einem außergewöhnlich atmosphärischen Erlebnis montiert wurde. Schon der erste Track löst durch seine unverhohlen symphonische Gefälligkeit milde Verwunderung aus, von einem hintergründig einsetzenden Knistern unauffällig in Richtung sphärisches Wohlbefinden bugsiert. Könnte von mir aus ewig so weitergehen, ist aber bedauerlicher weise schon nach wenigen Minuten vorbei. Danach folgt mit dem zweiten Stück die längste Passage des Albums, eine über zwanzig Minuten währende Zeitschleife, die sich bisweilen behutsam zu dringlich pulsierenden Schwebungen verdichtet und nicht eine Sekunde zu lang erscheint. Und auch im weiteren Verlauf erweist sich, was an der Oberfläche betrachtet in unspektakuläre Monotonie abzugleiten vermeint, als eine gar nicht so abstrakte und darüber hinaus außerordentlich detailreiche Meditation zum Thema Drones und Ambient zwischen entrückter Schönheit und unheimlichen Klanglayern. Essentiell.
>Matthias Bolt, Quiet Noise, 5.2007

Ok, conosciamo abbastanza di Günter Müller, ex batterista ormai convertito all'elettronica, a percussioni fuori dall'ordinario, iPod, campionatori e quant'altro, proprietario della prestigiosa For 4 Ears, e vero e proprio musicista prezzemolo della scena musicale; collaborazioni con in pratica ogni nome che si rispetti, specie se dagli occhi a mandorla. Ma a dispetto di una discografia sterminata, non sono molti i dischi ascrivibili esclusivamente al musicista svizzero. È per questo, ma non solo, che “Reframed” rappresenta un'uscita molto interessante, anzi una vera e propria piccola sorpresa data la freschezza e qualità della musica contenuta. Abbastanza diverso rispetto al suo “tipico” suono, che solitamente contribuisce non poco a riempire i vuoti nelle partnership con altri musicisti, con quel fondale di superfici, ora levigate ora abrasive, ma sempre pulsanti seconda una logica ritmica mutante e fuzzyficata. Qui invece la musica è maggiormente astratta, si fa meditativa, sfiora derive umorali quasi ambient e propone dense distese di suono pregnante, dove quel che rimane del senso del ritmo assume forme ancora più sfumate e cerebrali (ma non cervellotiche). Non sempre è facile capire le fonti utilizzate per produrre certa musica, anzi, in certi casi diventa una sorta di rebus, ma è interessante sapere che, stando alle note, questo cd è stato costruito partendo dal suono di cimbali campionati e ri-processati. Non so, e non voglio neanche sapere cosa significhi esattamente da un punto di vista tecnico, ma i risultati sono notevoli, all'insegna di un attento lavoro di composizione, che accosta e assembla con gran classe, con quel tocco di calore spesso assente da certe produzioni. Ad ogni modo, anche se opportunamente rielaborati, in più momenti i cimbali sono ben identificabili, magari assimilati da qualche nebulosa di suoni, ma anche brillanti di luce propria. Quasi da cinema Lynchiano (hmmm, qualcuno, e non solo il sottoscritto, inizia ad abusare di questo termine, ma rende l'idea) l'inizio di Reframed 1, il suono che si innalza ed espande come l'alba di un nuovo giorno, e quell'effetto acustico roteante che sembra la bobina di un film intrappolata in un loop. Ancora un piccolo passo verso l'astrazione in Reframed 2, perfetto meccanismo d'incastri frequenziali, e un'idea sottile di ritmo, dovuta all'interazione delle sinusoidi e ai patterns circolari e risonanti che ne derivano. Sempre affascinanti questo genere di suoni, con il loro occasionale sfuggire al controllo del musicista, e creare da soli sfruttando le leggi fisiche. Verso la fine qui i cimbali diventano sempre più intellegibili, si avverte l'effetto fisico della loro presenza e se ne immagina la manipolazione, mentre un gran pulsare inghiotte tutto. Chiaroscuri e feedback avvolgente a volontà in Reframed 3, dove i cimbali appaiono e scompaiono dal background come ombre furtive. Leggermente più urticante, ma ancora ben avvolta da una cappa onirica, la traccia conclusiva, che in maniera impassibile macina un formicolio di bits su cui spirali metalliche tracciano ampi giri. Ripeto, una sorpresa, non mi aspettavo queste eleganti introspezioni tra sospensione e trasfigurazione del suono.
>Alfio Castorina, Kathodik, 3.2007

Müller’s ambient drone is quiet and reflective, and while there is not much to recommend it as a different kind of quiet and reflective drone than what you’ve heard before, it is still welcoming and though-provoking. Anything that inspires a calm and silent mind works for me. A set of five tracks built off manipulated and bowed cymbals, “Reframed” explores what sound does by itself when given room to move. Though Müller has performed with the likes of such human riots as Otomo Yoshihide and Jim O’Rourke, he has also played with guitarist Taku Sugimoto, whose work this record is more comparable. Like Sugimoto, Müller’s pieces incorporate the atmosphere and the sounds of the environment as well as the manipulated instrumentation. The result is a wash of sound and presence that seems oddly timeless.
>Mike Wood, Music Emissions, 3.2007

I was just beginning to penetrate the mysteries of Günter Müller's remixing process on the splendid double CD on Esquilo, Live and Replayed, when this one appeared in the mailbox a couple of weeks or so ago. Cut CDs never fail to grab the attention, thanks to Jason Kahn's classy Op Art covers, and they always sound as good as they look. Reframed is for all you gong junkies who've already worn out their CDRs of Mark Wastell's Vibra 1 and redownloaded it from wmo/r. Which means it's right up there with James Tenney's Having Never Written A Note For Percussion, Mathias Spahlinger's entlöschend and Rhys Chatham's Two Gongs as one of the Great Bowed Metal Pieces (oops, forgot Eddie Prévost's Entelechy there). Though you'd probably never figure out that this gorgeous music is all sourced from bowed cymbals unless somebody told you – it could be distant thunder, passing traffic heard from a nearby hilltop or Gregorian chant recorded in the depths of a cave system – hard to believe such rich, deep and mysterious sonorities could come from those round shiny things you see sweaty drummers battering the shit out of on MTV. But it's true: listen carefully to track three and you might just catch a metallic edge to Müller's delicate crescendos. Elsewhere though it's as magical and inscrutable as Eliane Radigue (except perhaps for the fifth and final track where some of Müller's laptop clicks peek through the clouds). Wonderful stuff, check it out.
>Dan Warburton, Paristransatlantic, 4.2007

Auf Reframed präsentiert Günter Müller fünf 'processed recordings of bowed cymbals'. Ganz sonor summen und dröhen Wellen in- und übereinander. Im ersten Part erklingt dazu ein Flickern wie wenn ein Super-8-Film dazu laufen würde. Der Dröhnklang pulsiert und vibriert in sich und emaniert Obertonwellen, wodurch eine gewisse Mehrstimmigkeit entsteht. Unterschiedliche Wellenlängen und kleine Temposchwankungen verbieten es, an Monotonie auch nur zu denken. Diese wabernde Psychedelik möchte wahrscheinlich bei geschlossenen Augen oder überhaupt im Dunkeln ihre Wirkung entfalten. Im beständigen Pulsieren und Morphen der Wellen können sich die Synapsen anregen lassen oder entspannen wie unter den Fingern eines Zerebralmasseurs. Illusionär sind manche Momente, die an das Brummen eines Flugzeuges erinnern und damit mich an meine Wald- und Wiesenphase in den 70ern, als Wolkengucker, zu verstört, um mich in eine dieser dahin ziehenden Maschinen hinein zu träumen. Inzwischen kann ich Müllers nirgendwohin führende Dröhnwellen positiv besetzen. ‚Fort‘ ist keine Richtung, die mich lockt. Alles passiert überall. Ob Reframed einen einlullt und beruhigt wie ein Abend mit Goldrand oder ganz im Gegenteil unruhig und unbehaglich stimmt wie ein düster umgrummelter Saum, hängt von individuellen Chemien und momentanen Wechselwirkungen ab. Bei Pt.5 lässt sich etwas Drängendes, fiebrig Animiertes, das einen dunkel umrauscht und umquillt, jedoch schon fast mit Händen greifen.
>Rigobert Dittmann, Bad Alchemy, 4.2007

Quite a surprising solo release from the prolific genius of German/Swiss soundmaker Günter Müller, if you're familiar with his trademark percussion+electronics sound. "Reframed" features five untitled tracks of treated bowed cymbals drones, and while the final result surely stands on its own, I was reminded of Mark Wastell's equally solemn "Vibra", or some of Bertoia's "Somnambient" pieces. Here, the metallic resonance of bowed metal is carefully processed and layered into pure, highly abstract, Lucier-like forms, free to merge and fill the air around you, occasionally reaching peaks of intimidating power.
>Eugenio Maggi, Chain DLK, 4.2007

Muller’s ambient drone is quiet and reflective, and while there is not much to recommend it as a different kind of quiet and reflective drone than what you’ve heard before, it is still welcoming and though-provoking. Anything that inspires a calm and silent mind works for me. A set of five tracks built off manipulated and bowed cymbals, “Reframed” explores what sound does by itself when given room to move. Though Muller has performed with the likes of such human riots as Otomo Yoshihide and Jim O’Rourke, he has also played with guitarist Taku Sugimoto, whose work this record is more comparable. Like Sugimoto, Muller’s pieces incorporate the atmosphere and the sounds of the environment as well as the manipulated instrumentation. The result is a wash of sound and presence that seems oddly timeless.
>Mike Wood, Music Emissions, 3.2007

“Reframed” is a five-piece collection which was entirely created by processing the sounds of bowed cymbals. It is quite a different outing for Müller, whose mastery in modificating sources and rendering them unrecognizable is here exalted at the maximum level. The record starts with a quasi-consonant introduction of sorts, characterized by an immediately alluring undercurrent of muffled frequencies and foggy overtones that made me think to everything but cymbals; picture instead a condensed version of Niblockian beatings caressed by a not-too-powerful desert wind. The second part is also the longest at over 20 minutes, and its influence is even more perceivable in terms of irregular waves dampened by projections of uneven percussive shadows. The game of contraction and expansion that belongs to these kinds of frequency closeness results in the typical “wowowo” oscillation that a naked room cuddles in every corner for the ears to bath in, the perennial reason for which this kind of music finds its raison d’etre in the very air where it propagates. On pure sensual gratification, my favourite track is the fourth, a fantastic comparison of analogous magnitudes where the decontextualization of the cymbal sound, made easier by Müller’s choice of completely eliminating the attack, stimulates our brain up to an increased capacity of managing the control of the energetic fluxes, the sounds halfway through the softened rumble of a yacht engine and distant urban traffic heard with earplugs on. Also, the usual ticking/clicking recurrence of many of Müller’s compositions is heard in various spots throughout the disc. What should be considered is the overall high quality of the project; while “Reframed” is certainly not something overly new in terms of sound, as many other artists have entered these realms by now, its effects are certainly highly beneficial to our being, for we’re subjected to a continuous state of “semi-relaxation” that at one and the same time elicits reactions and somnolence. This blissful navigation through our cerebral structures is what determines the success of this release together with its accessibility, even for those who are more familiar with the “mystical” aspects of this game. In conclusion, this is a cryptically seducing album that calls for the “repeat” button.
>Massimo Ricci, Touching Extremes, 3.2007

Moving towards a more extreme expression of the atmospheric in relation to his later albums, the author explores experimental materials in a contained fashion, devoid of other sources, as single elements in progressive evolution. From an experimental extended technique acoustic sources are observed, like a sound mass being sculpted, displaying the immediacy of details, revealing its complexity as the tracks unfolds. The various nuances of its sonic behaviour, the body captured in resonance, waking the shimmering of bronze iridescence, the frequencies are the result of a careful observation of tiny cymbal overtones.
>Modisti, 4.2007

Hot on the heels of Live and Replayed, Günter Müller’s set for Esquilo, comes another solo offering. The music on Reframed consists entirely of the processed sounds of bowed cymbals. Since 1981, Müller’s set-up has involved using mobile pick-ups to capture percussive sounds, and in more recent years the sounds have also been looped and modified electronically. His sonic palette has been extended by the use of minidisc recorders and iPods, which allow him the opportunity to work with pre-prepared material, and although his credentials as an improvisor are impeccable this shift in emphasis has resulted in a more composerly approach to his material. In Will Montgomery’s largely favourable review of Live and Replayed (Wire 277), he mentioned that a “more ‘composed’ approach to ordering the source sounds” might prove rewarding. That’s precisely what Reframed offers.
Perhaps the most important thing to say about the five pieces of music on Reframed is that they sound absolutely gorgeous. This is one of the most sumptuous musical experiences I’ve had in a long while. The rasping attack as the bow bites and the cymbal begins to sound appear largely to be absent from these recordings, and where attack characteristics are present they seem to have been modified electronically and turned into percussive pulsations. In most cases you wouldn’t know these pieces had been made using cymbals. Once you do know, their bright, flaring shimmer and dark undertow, thickened on occasion to the sonority of a not entirely consonant church organ, have a harmonic fingerprint that’s readily identifiable as such. Whether these organic soundscapes have been fully composed or not hardly matters, though, ironically, as the gradual drift of the material and the billowing clouds of sound provide few signposts to indicate where one is in the music, the tendency is to focus more on the moment by moment creation of the piece than on its architecture, akin to what improvisors do.
>Brian Marley, The Wire, 3.2007

In its characteristic on thick cardboard boxes, both simple and at the same time with an elegant design by label owner Jason Kahn, its delivered a new work of this artist musician based in Switzerland.
'Reframed' includes/understands 5 subjects that were recorded between August and December of 2006. Günter as a skillful percussionist, he uses bowed cymbals creating with them imperceptible rhythms, whose resonances are yielding drones. Innumerable layers appear as a result of a work of processing.
'Reframed 1' holds high frequencies, acute sounds, noise, while the beats over the cymbal become permanent.
'Reframed 2' is airy and synthetic than the first track. On the backdrop small metallic rhythms are perceived and a broad range of frequencies.
On 'Reframed 3' smooth rhythms and percussions throw shimmering timbres.
'Reframed 4' has abstract noises and towards the end of the track the bowed cymbals percussion is clearer.
Finally on 'Reframed 5' the percussion is more persistent and drones tend to disappear in silence...
>Guillermo Escudero, Loop, 3.2007

Günter Müller, the owner of "For 4 Ears" label, released a fascinating exploration of the inherent resonant properties of processed bowed cymbals. Expect to be placed deep within hovering layers of shimmering sound, swirling around you, fading out sense of time. Again an outstanding CD of the swiss-based label "cut", which provides us with excellent, inspiring work since 10 years.
First I have to mention the exquisite, witty and minimal, silkscreened cover which represents the distinctive mark of artwork at "cut". It´s printed on thick cardboard and is designed by the label-owner Jason Kahn, who worked as typographer and layoutartist in the 1980´s. I like his design a lot and it has the advantage, that I find the CDs of "cut" fast among hundreds of others.
Günter Müller, a well known percussionist, who performs solo and has collaborated with a large number of musicians, including Jim O'Rourke, Christian Marclay, Butch Morris, Otomo Yoshihide, Taku Sugimoto, Keith Rowe, Sachiko M, has composed five pieces out of processed recordings of bowed cymbals. If not mentioned in the liner notes, I would not recognize any cymbals, but on the other hand I never heard "bowed" cymbals before. And it´s astonishing what a wide spectrum of drones is archived out of this instruments, also we know they were processed afterwards.
Günter Müller not only managed to form interesting, pleasing sounds, he´s also a master in arranging them to whole captivating compositions.
Track 1, or "Reframed 1", is a very organic, subtle evolving complex of overlayed tones, not changing in pitch but timbre. It contains a sort of "sacral" character .
"Reframed 2" is more open and airy, and there are fine harmonic vibrations which vitalize the structure. The broad range of frequencies interact magically together without covering up to much and create a dense imposing cloud.
In "Reframed 3" Günter Müller seems to use a lot of feedback, gently sweeping in space. Mostly deeper frequencies are his ingredients here.
"Reframed 4" has a metallic touch and plays also in the deeper regions of sound.
The whole piece changes in a very subtle way but (and I would really like to know how he manages that) again captures my ears skilfully.
"Reframed 5" concludes the CD with a harsh and dense drone, garnished with clicks and chiming parts which remind faintly to dissonant piano chords.
I´m increasingly impressed after several rounds of "Reframed", as it´s capturing me more and more. The clouds of drones are so much skillfully woven, that I´m often clueless how Günter Müller archieved this intense, organic and inspiring work. Maybe his vast experience of playing and composing experimental music over decades could be one explanation.
>Sascha Renner, 2.2007

Günter Müller is well-known as a drummer, although he has been known to play 'electronics, mini disc and ipod' for some time too alongside his own system of making live transformations of his drum sound. Like said, solo recordings are quite sparse for him. On Reframed he has five pieces which he made of processing bowed cymbals. That probably leads the reader to the world of subtle drone music, and so does the music. Deep sounding of faint traces of endlessly sustaining sounds of cymbals. It's a bit unclear how he did it, which I believe is not really of big importance anyway, but it seems to me various layers of the same sound, which have been subtly treated accordingly. The all sound at the same time, but very carefully Müller changes the mix between the various layers and builds not a very intense piece of music, but rather a highly atmospherical mix of layers. A great disc, and a big surprise. It marks a difference between his solo work and that of Müller as an improviser and should easily appeal to those who love Mirror, Ora and such like.
>Frans de Waard, Vital, 2.2007

Ursprünglich ein Schlagzeuger, hat Günter Müller sein Instrument über die Jahre hinweg immer mehr mit elektronischen Geräten erweitert und inzwischen für seine Live-Auftritte gar vollständig mit solchen ersetzt. Trotzdem nehmen Schlagzeug-Klänge noch eine spezielle Rolle in seiner Arbeit ein: Bei der vorliegenden CD handelt es sich um mittels Computer weiterverarbeitete Klänge von gestrichenen Becken. Die so entstandene Musik erinnert an langsam aber unaufhaltsam fortschreitende Lavamassen, eine kompakte Einheit, die alle Zeit der Welt hat sein Ziel zu erreichen. Die Grundstimmung ist zwar eher düster, allerdings sind viele der erklingenden Flächen konsonant und es gibt sogar Stellen (zum Beispiel im ersten Track) wo die Musik beinahe symphonisch anmutet. Insgesamt ist es eine sehr gelungene CD, die bestimmte Ideen von Müllers früherer Arbeit als Solist aufnimmt (z. B. von "Eight Landscapes" aus dem Jahre 2003), welche sich aber gleichzeitig auch von diesen unterscheidet und den einen oder anderen Kenner von Müllers Musik überraschen wird.
>Tomas Korber, Jazz n' More, 2.2007

Two solo recordings from our Swiss contingent (OK, OK, Kahn’s a US ex-pat, but still), both using processed sounds from original recordings either self-made or taped in the field. Neither exactly kicks you in the gut on first blush, but both insinuate their way into your aural grasp if given extended, concentrated listens.
The first sounds encountered on each are also just a little startling. On “Fields”, that sound is pretty damn close to a train whistle. All aboard. It lingers for a good bit before giving way to a soft, rapid percussive patter and some chewy radio static. Very simple, in a sense, but very solid and satisfying. While the subsequent pieces differ in particulars, there’s something of a like strain running through them, that of taking only three or four elements and laying them alongside one another, shifting the relationships subtly and allowing the listener to perceive the varying resultant patterns. The third track, for instance, combines a low, waffling sound with mid-range soft static (like a radio station fluttering in and out of range) and tiny, high-end crackles and blips. Each of these modulates within their range and when they do, especially as the fluctuations are gradual, new relationships emerge between them. Quietly tapped cymbals are introduced right at the end or perhaps had been there all along and are just then peeking into audibility. It’s concise and self-contained and while the cuts are short enough (about four to nine minutes) to allow one to at least attempt to mentally keep track of some of the pattern activity, I still found that the brief lengths perhaps work a bit against the music in terms of sameness of approach. The air of calm studiousness in effect might, imho, work better over longer periods of time. Almost every track here, I’d have liked to have heard at greater length, especially when one of the elements is, for example, a field recording from what seems to be a large interior space. You get the intimation that there’s so much there and you’ve only just tasted the edges. Still, these are minor nits to pick.
Muller’s “Reframed” also commences with an atypical sound, something very near to a church organ, soon accompanied by a low flutter, statics and other, less reedy hums. The only thing is: all these pieces are the result of his having reprocessed recordings of bowed cymbals. I’ve been less than blown away by recent solo offerings from Muller, far preferring to hear him in the company of others (where he’s generally invaluable), so this release came as a welcome surprise. I think it’s the best solo Muller I’ve heard in a good long while. It’s not that it’s drastically different from previous offerings like “Eight Landscapes” or last year’s “Live and Replayed” on Esquilo, just that he’s made his tweaks, to these ears, in the right direction, accentuating especially juicy areas and structuring the pieces more strongly with none of the meandering that sometimes marred the other efforts. The cymbalic nature of the sound sources is more apparent in the longer (22 minutes) second track, with its intersecting waves of padded-mallet thumping forming matrices of crests and troughs. (I found myself reminded, of all things, of the opening section of the Art Ensemble of Chicago’s “Ohnedaruth” from “Phase One”). It holds up extremely well over its span, no small feat considering the “limited” nature of its elements. The next is probably my favorite, a piece that manages to be engrossingly spacey without being at all vacuous although, qualitatively, I find the pieces to be almost equally strong. Why this one works and countless others mining similar veins don’t is, of course, difficult to say except that I get a sense of commitment, of focused intelligence here that generally goes missing when such areas are explored.
Both “Fields” and “Reframed” are fine, thoughtful recordings. If I think Muller hits his mark more regularly than Kahn this time out, I could easily imagine listeners who’ve previously enjoyed the work of both feeling the reverse. What I’d really like to hear is another duo from them at this level; “Blinks” is a decent enough record, but my mental combine of these two is in a different league altogether.
>Brian Olewnick, Bagatellen, 2.2007

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